Major Types of Interventions

Capacity building and support to each other and panchayat/line department functionaries

Advocacy of required policy changes at the local, the state and national levels

Impacts: Workers Registration

Partners have worked to ensure that workers secure their entitlements under the Act. Brief highlights of the impacts of these efforts are (these figures relate to panchayats selected by partners for intensive work):

In Andhra less than 50% households had job cards, the figure rose to more than 90% (increase of 60%)

Impacts: Work Demand, Employment and Wages

After worker registration, the next step was to ensure that work demand is stepped up. Since MGNREGA is demand-driven, without the trigger of work demand, it would not be possible for wage-seekers to get work. The impacts of efforts in this direction in target panchayats have also been very dramatic:

In Andhra Pradesh, there was a 3-fold rise in the total work applications facilitated. There is also a marked though gradual increase in participation of SC and ST families

In Andhra Pradesh, The average number of wage days in the selected 21 villages has increased from 45 days in 2007-08 to 75 days in 2009-10, which is higher than the state average of 64 days for the year 2009-10.

Average working days under MGNREGA in Uttar Pradesh is 28 days, but in the 11 districts in which PANI is working, this stands at 75 days; in the Halia block where partner Aarthik Anusandhan Kendra operates, the figure stands at 42 days.

In Orissa, 182% rise overall from 3183 to 8896; some partners registered 5 to 7 fold increase. In 2010, there was a 119% increase in households submitting work applications to Panchayats

In Chhattisgarh, 34-fold rise from 211 job applications to more than 7000

Madhya Pradesh: 123% overall increase from 8500 to more than 18000 applications

Rajasthan: 174% increase

Gujarat: 273% increase in Devgadh-Baria block and 124% increase in Dahod district as a result of RRLJ

In the notoriously distress migration prone Koraput-Bolangir-Kalahandi belt in Orissa, the number of households resorting to distress migration in the project villages of consortium partners came down from 4,252 households in 2008-09 to 1,937 households in 2009-10

77% of the migrating households in Andhra Pradesh have completely stopped migration.

Impacts: Work Sanctioned and Implemented

Work demand registration also had an immediate impact on work creation as reflected in the following:

In Karnataka, value of works sanctioned on Trench-cum-bund technology popularized by Samuha, rose from Rs.16 lakhs to Rs.7 crores

Chhattisgarh 7-fold rise Rs.97 lakhs to Rs.7.04 cr in works sanctioned; 4-fold increase in works implemented

Madhya Pradesh: 8-fold increase from about Rs.1.4 crores to Rs.13 crores in sanctioned works, 8-fold increase in value of works implemented

Rajasthan: 175% increase in value of sanctioned works

Gujarat: RRLJ’s impact led to 275% increase in Devgadh-Baria block of Dahod district and 124% rise in Dahod district

Planning and Implementation Support

In all states, partners have worked with village communities and panchayats to created detailed micro-plans worth more than Rs.150 crores

These plans have been ratified by the Gram Sabhas and are being used by panchayats for implementation

Impact on incomes, indebtedness and migration have been dramatic.

In several instances, partners have built upon the water infrastructure created under MGNREGA to converge livelihoods interventions in agriculture and micro-credit.

On Policy

The major recommendations of the MGNREGA Consortium’s two reports (both released by ministers of rural development, GoI) have found their way into the forthcoming MGNREGA Guidelines which are a complete revamp of the earlier operational guidelines. These recommendations include:

focus on human resources as a major bottleneck and setting up cluster level teams to facilitate GPs to carry out MGNREGA work

setting up of a national level anchoring structure and similar structures at the state levels

creating a capacity building plan across the country and identifying institutions which would do this work

better use of information technology with end-to-end integrated MIS systems

a mandate role for civil society – the new guidelines actually devote an entire chapter outlining the precise contours of such partnerships

the Consortium’s report on Leveraging MGNREGA for flood protection in Bihar has also found expression in the new MGNREGA guidelines and the expanded list of permissible works

the film The Road Back Home produced by the Consortium on distress migration in Western Odisha and the potential of MGNREGA in mitigating it has been screened widely before policy-makers, administration, Gram Panchayats and wage-seekers across the state